Conversation with my son

“What is your favourite book?” He asks me.
I try to answer, but discover that is is one of those things which changes over time, what might be my favourite book at one time might not be my favourite at others. Some which are perennial favourites become coloured with sadness. I have to learn that sharing my favourite things with others sometimes means that they will touch them, not just literally.

I ask him if I can have a top ten. He approves.

Three of them are books I have read to him. The others I have shared with other people, sometimes never to see them again.

“What is your favourite colour?”

Oh. I think. Difficult. Then decide on burgundy.

“What is your favourite song?”

Again I find I can’t answer directly. Its not that I am indecisive, maybe it is, its just that I can’t put my finger on one. Just one? Can I have a top ten for this too?

Once again I ask and he approves.

I am lost in the words of songs which make me want to curl up and weep for all the memories they stir within me.

So many songs which are favourites because of the memories associated with them, or which then become unbearable because of the emotions.

What if he asks me who my favourite person is? How do I answer? That I love him as much as his sister but that they both mean so much to me in their own different ways? What about those I have chosen to love?

Loving my children didn’t involve any decision, it just was. Did loving anyone else require a consious choice? Did I decide to love them or did I just decide to accept that I love and therefore accept the pain which goes with it? Do they mean more even though they are no longer in my life? Have they meant more? Or is it just different?

I find myself adrift in an ocean of memories, all because of three simple questions from one little boy.